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India seeks Lanka's help
to probe Tiger links

New Delhi, which sought the extradition of Sri Lanka's top Tamil Tiger supremo Velupillai Prabhakaran in June 1995, had a team of officials visiting Colombo last month for routine follow-up action, officials and diplomats said.

The Sunday Times said the Indian team "reviewed an earlier request" that Delhi had made for the extradition of Prabhakaran, wanted in connection with the 1991 assassination of former Indian premier Rajiv Gandhi.

However, another private newspaper, the Sunday Leader, quoted Sri Lankan attorney general K C Kamalasabayson as saying that Indian officials had not specifically asked for Prabhakaran's extradition this time.

Kamalasabayson said the Indians wanted to interview a member of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) identified as "Nixon" who is in police custody here.

Calling for extradition was "a formal procedural exercise and was not a specific request made during the team's visit" Kamalasabayson was quoted as saying. Sri Lanka's attorney general's department was not immediately available for comment.

The extradition of Prabhakaran will remain an academic question as long as the 46-year-old rebel leader remains at large. He is believed to be somewhere in the island's north-east.

The LTTE was recently under the spotlight in India for its alleged involvement in the abduction of India film icon Dr Rajakumar by Tamil Nadu brigand Veerappan.

The reports of Prabhakaran's possible extradition appeared as the government of President Chandrika Kumaratunga attempted to open talks with the LTTE in a bid to end decades of ethnic bloodshed.

Norway's peace envoy to Sri Lanka, Erik Solheim, had a rare meeting with Prabhakaran in the north of the country on November 1, a move that the international community has welcomed as a significant development.

India's Home Minister L K Advani told the Rajya Sabha last week that a high-level India mission visited Colombo in mid-November "to clear formalities" for his extradition.

The Sunday Leader said that India re-opening the case of Prabhakaran's extradition could be a subtle move to sabotage the peace process.

"The Indian minister's statement, coming on the heels of the internationally-backed Norwegian peace initiative, is viewed as a subtle move to thwart the peace process in Sri Lanka by sending a message to Prabhakaran that he will have to face a charge of murder if he enters the democratic mainstream and starts negotiations with the government," it said.

Norway entered the scene to broker peace after both Colombo and the LTTE invited Oslo to play the role of facilitator to arrange negotiations between the two sides.

More than 60,000 people have been killed in fighting in the past two decades.

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